20 Years of Me, My Wife, SEGA, and Sonic the Hedgehog

It’s a strange thing. For much of my life, I’ve been used to having something of a strong affiliation with certain video game characters, namely Mario and Mega Man. But it wasn’t until recently and thinking ahead to this June that it occurred to me how much another character has been there, almost intrinsically as a part of the second half of my life: Sonic the Hedgehog.

Next month, my wife, Nadia, and I will be celebrating our 20th wedding anniversary. Only days later, another anniversary will be taking place: the 30th anniversary of the original release of Sonic the Hedgehog for the SEGA Genesis. This wasn’t by design, though. According to my wife (who set things up with her mother), June 9th was the date they had available, and they took it.

I know that the two dates being a mere 14 days apart can make it seem like they’re not that closely related. However, the thing with video game anniversaries is that they tend to run for more than just the one day, and so the celebration can bleed out into other things, as you’ll soon see. But even before we made plans to get married, it appears that there was some foreshadowing of the role Sonic would play.

The first time my then-future wife and I met was when I visited Toronto. (Yeah, I was the guy who had a “Canadian girlfriend,” and it turned out to be true.) We’d been talking and getting to know each other through various means, such as email, message boards, and mIRC (for the younger among you, think of it as an older version of Discord), so we weren’t exactly strangers. So when I came to visit, we wound up having gifts for each other.

Foremost among the gifts she had for me was a Sonic the Hedgehog figure, the regular 11″ version from Resaurus’ Sonic Adventure line. I really loved that thing, and displayed it proudly opposite the similarly-sized Super Mario Bros. Mario plush figure from Applause.

That’s why it still breaks my heart that the first gift she gave me when we met in-person inexplicably got lost somehow, I believe during a move. Some show up on eBay, but at inflated prices and, more importantly, not shipping to Canada (which would no doubt inflate the price considerably more).

Fast-forwarding back to the whole marriage thing, we got married in June 2001, which just so happened to coincide with the release of Sonic Adventure 2, which was itself released on the 10th anniversary of the original Sonic the Hedgehog for the SEGA Genesis. So basically, our anniversary numbers are now Sonic’s, minus ten. Neat!

That on its own might just make for some amusing trivia, but there’s been other things through the years that follow on from that.

Incidentally, since SEGA had announced they were leaving the hardware business at the start of that year, it would so happen that the very first console we bought as a married couple would be a Dreamcast:

This is the version I got, picked up at a Sam Goody’s later that year when I had to make a trip to take care of some unfinished business. It was quite a deal, including a blue Visual Memory Unit and copies of Sonic Adventure, Sonic Shuffle, and a demo of Sonic Adventure 2. We played those games a lot, let me tell you.

Incidentally, while I still have the Dreamcast and VMU, I have no idea where those games are. Or the disc for Super Smash Bros. Melee we had gotten for our first Christmas after getting married. I can’t help but think that someone basically robbed us, and it still infuriates me all these years later. I hate thieves enough as it is, but the stuff missing had deeper sentimental value to me.

But I digress.

Five years later, Nadia would get to take her first trip to the Electronic Entertainment Expo (E3) as a part of working with 1UP.com. At the time, SEGA was celebrating the 15th anniversary of Sonic the Hedgehog and showing off their latest title for the then-next generation of platforms, the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3. She checked out the demo, and came away with a special Sonic shirt she still has to this day:

Perhaps the high point would come in 2011. See, that’s when I got to go to my first (and at this rate, possibly last) E3, and Nadia went, too! We made it something of a special occasion, as it was our first E3 together and our 10th anniversary, too… which also means that it was Sonic’s 20th anniversary as well. And this year, they were going bigger than I think they’d ever gone before, hosting a special “Sonic Boom” party at Club Nokia for the occasion:

Lucky for us, Nadia managed to score an invite to the event — and she got to bring a +1!

It was an interesting time, to be sure. Mainly because when we arrived, we were directed to this upstairs lounge where they had Sonic-themed blue drinks and stuff, but no connection to the downstairs area, which is where all the real action was happening (you could still view it from a balcony, though), including Sonic swag and demo kiosks for Sonic Generations. And no one seemed to know how to get down there, until we found out we had to actually leave the building, circle around, and come in another way — which we were reluctant to do without knowing first, because what if we couldn’t get back in, right?

In addition to getting up closer and personal with the festivities, we also got our hands on some of those plush Sonic head/ears/quills, Sonic Generations coasters, lanyards, and shirts:

I think we might have been too late to get the pins, though.

Before we went downstairs, though, I did get to take advantage of a setup upstairs that allowed me to leave a birthday message for Sonic, and get some pictures taken, if I remember correctly. Definitely got some pictures taken, at any rate:

And yes, I’m fully aware of the irony of wearing a Mario shirt to Sonic’s party. Truth be told, the Generations shirt I got there was my first-ever Sonic shirt (surprisingly), and since Mario and Sonic were pals and Olympic buddies now, I figured it was fair game.

While we were there, I also got to play Sonic Generations (naturally, and both versions, at that!) speak to Sonic Social Media Manager Aaron Webber and thank him for throwing such a great shindig.

Also something I feel is worth noting is that at some point around 2006, I would come to get to know one Ian Flynn — who was the new writer for Archie’s longstanding Sonic the Hedgehog comic — and his then-future wife, Aleah. I would become a moderator on his message board, and when he came to Toronto, introduce them to Nadia. We’ve been good friends ever since, to such a degree that they’re usually the ones we call upon to watch our cats when we’re going to be away for a few days!

Through this, and with some big help from Aaron Webber and others, the four of us were able to put on the “Sonic Lost World ‘First Play’ Charity Marathon” to raise money for the Sick Kids hospital, where we played through the not-yet released Sonic Lost World for Wii U over the course of 24 hours, leading to such moments as this:

It took us a moment, but I think we managed to sync up before too long.

This was our first-ever livestream, as well as our first-ever (but hopefully not last) charity fundraiser, and in the end, we raised $2,262 for Sick Kids.

Suffice to say, there’s been lots more fun with Sonic over the last two decades (they’re a favorite subject of ours for watching speedruns and Let’s Plays), but not everything is tied to our marriage and anniversaries. Still, for as much as there has been and what there has been, it’s been a blast, and adds a little extra something to look forward to on these special occasions.

I hope you’ve enjoyed joining me on this look back over my last two decades of marriage, and how Sonic and SEGA played a memorable part in it over the years. I can’t wait to see what happens in the years to come.

Thanks for reading!

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David Oxford is a freelance writer of many varied interests. If you’re interested in hiring him, please drop him a line at david.oxford (at) nyteworks.net.